children were considered common to all; conditions that up to their
final transition into monogamy underwent a whole series of
modifications. These modifications slowly and gradually contract the
circle comprised by the common tie of marriage until only the single
couple remains which prevails to-day.

In thus constructing backward the history of the family, Morgan, in
harmony with the majority of his colleagues, arrives at a primeval
condition, where unrestricted sexual intercourse existed within a tribe,
so that every woman belonged to every man, and vice versa.

Much has been said about this primeval state of affairs since the
eighteenth century, but only in general commonplaces. It is one of
Bachofen's great merits to have taken the subject seriously and to have
searched for traces of this state in historical and religious
traditions. To-day we know that these traces, found by him, do not lead
back to a stage of unlimited sexual intercourse, but to a much later
form, the group marriage. The primeval stage, if it really ever existed,
belongs to so remote a period, that we can hardly expect to find direct
proofs of its former existence among these social fossils, backward
savages. Bachofen's merit consists in having brought this question to
the fore.[7]

It has lately become a fashion to deny the existence of this early stage
of human sex life, in order to spare us this "shame." Apart from the
absence of all direct proof, the example of the rest of animal life is
invoked. From the latter, Letourneau (Evolution du mariage et de la
famille, 1888) quoted numerous facts, alleged to prove that among
animals also an absolutely unlimited sexual intercourse belongs to a
lower stage. But I can only conclude from all these facts that they
prove absolutely nothing for man and the primeval conditions of his
life. The mating of vertebrates for a lengthy term is sufficiently
explained by physiological causes, e. g., among birds by the
helplessness of the female during brooding time. Examples of faithful
monogamy among birds do not furnish any proofs for men, for we are not
descended from birds.

And if strict monogamy is the height of virtue, then the palm belongs to
the tapeworm that carries a complete male and female sexual apparatus in
each of its 50 to 200 sections and passes its whole lifetime in
fertilizing itself in every one of its sections. But if we confine
ourselves to mammals, we find all forms of sexual intercourse